Sony CEO Eyes Products That ‘Push the Envelope’

Perhaps it’s a sign of progress that much of the focus at Sony Corp. these days is not about its long-suffering electronics business, but what the company plans to do with its entertainment and financial arms.

Mr. Hirai also addressed how Sony is moving to the second phase of his plan to turn around its electronics business. The Sony chief said he spent much of his first 18 months as CEO playing what he calls “defense” — cutting costs and streamlining the organization. However, the electronics division is now switching to offense with a wave of new products that “push the envelope,” according to Mr. Hirai.

“It’s about having an offense strategy and defense strategy,” said Mr. Hirai. “Now, the offense strategy is coming out in the market.”

His comments come on the heels of Sony’s electronics business showing signs of improvement. In the latest quarter ended June, Sony’s TV business turned a profit for the first time in three years and its mobile products arm also moved into the black on the back of strong smartphone sales.

While Sony has scaled back the volume of its TV business, it has brought down its fixed costs considerably by unwinding liquid crystal display production joint ventures with Sharp Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co. to buy cheaper panels on the open market. Mr. Hirai said lower costs and a more efficient organization is important, but “that’s not going to move the bar” like a successful new product.

Mr. Hirai said the TV and mobile businesses benefited from cost-cutting and restructuring that Sony could start immediately but new products often take a year or longer to come to fruition. He pointed to Sony’s recently-unveiled lens camera, a smartphone attachment that brings the quality of a compact digital camera to handsets, and its ultrahigh-definition, or 4K, televisions as examples of innovative products that represent the company’s new product-focused push.

Mr. Hirai said he wants Sony’s product development teams to take risks and not kill innovative ideas through a process of “death by a thousand questions” that can sometimes over-analyze an interesting product. He said Sony’s RX1 digital camera, a compact model with a giant, full-frame image sensor that sells for an eye-popping Y250,000 ($2525), is a good example of this approach. While it may not make immediate business sense to sell a $2,500 compact camera, Sony said the reception from camera enthusiasts has been overwhelming and it can’t keep the camera in stores.

He also praised a product that wasn’t a commercial success – Sony’s Rolly music player introduced in 2007 – as the type of innovative gadget that the company should be making. The Rolly, a digital music player and speaker infused with robotic dancing that rotates and spins based on the tunes, garnered a lot of attention but it was never a hit.

“The Rolly says a lot about who we are,” he said. “That’s the kind of company we should be.”